March Letter From the Editor: Less Noise, Less Stress

I don’t know about you, but my brain is always whirring away. It’s a bit like when you bump into that annoying acquaintance in the corner shop and they won’t stop prattling on about inane things while you smile and nod, clutching a melting tub of Ben & Jerry’s. Or that joke we all make about why we don’t go on cruises because you’ll get stuck with an annoying couple. Well, my mind is like those annoying acquaintances except it’s constantly going on about what I need to do, what I need to plan, where I should be, how I can be better and so on.

It’s relentless. This month, our theme is Less Noise, because I think we could all do with a little more peace and quiet in our lives right about now. If you’re anything like me, from 6 a.m. to midnight, you’re online and on it with your mind racing. Enough is enough.

Phill Taylor

Throughout March, we’ll be looking at ways we can lead a simpler, less stressful existence, which doesn’t involve deserting your life for some far-flung, isolated commune.

We want to find out how we can slow things down to become more efficient (oh, and zen, definitely more zen). I’ll be sharing 31 decluttering tips (one for every day of the month because things, not just sounds, can create noise). Deputy Editor Shannon Peter will be asking whether silence is the new wellness frontier, and I’ll be investigating the new trend for “tech-light” moments in modern workplaces. Writer Giselle La-Pompe Moore will be showing you how to spring-clean your energy, and we’ll be getting outdoors to see just what it can do for our mental health.

Bad habits can create unwanted “noise,” so we’ll be discovering how to break a bad habit and create new, better and more fulfilling ones to replace it. And that’s not all—on 13 March, we’ll be announcing something exciting in the British Beauty Line, our “secret” Facebook group. It’s pretty out-there for a digital site to do what we’re going to do, but we think it’s important and worthwhile. Want to know what it is? Head to Facebook and request to join the group. It’s a fun, happy place where we chat beauty and wellness, so do pop by.

Oh, and finally, this month I’m going to tackle the beast. Not the “beast from the East,” but my inbox. I’ve never really been bothered by the number of emails that reside on my screen, but I’m going to streamline it and see whether a tidy inbox leads to a tidy mind. I’ll be sharing the results later this month, so stay tuned.